[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 2]
[House]
[Pages 2202-2203]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




            CONGRESSIONAL PROGRESSIVE CAUCUS: INFRASTRUCTURE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Walker). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 6, 2015, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Pocan) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. POCAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise on behalf of the Congressional 
Progressive Caucus, which is having our Special Order hour today to 
talk about the Nation's need for infrastructure--the fact that we need 
to keep serious investments in infrastructure not only to keep our 
roads and bridges and other important parts of our country together but 
also to help the good, family-supporting jobs that come along with 
these important investments in our infrastructure.
  I serve on the Budget Committee, and we were talking one day with Dr. 
Elmendorf from the Congressional Budget Office, our nonpartisan agency 
that we deal with to talk about budgetary matters.
  Specifically, I asked the question of Dr. Elmendorf about the 
Recovery Act that we passed in this country a number of years ago. Dr. 
Elmendorf said that, thanks to that Recovery Act, over 3 million jobs 
were saved or created because of the investment we put into our 
Nation's infrastructure.
  In my State of Wisconsin, I was at the State legislature at the time 
and I chaired our budget committee. We had a report from the road 
building industry and the vertical construction industry that said 
54,000 jobs just in Wisconsin were saved or created because of the 
Recovery Act.
  As much as that helped provide a boost to the economy and help fill 
our infrastructure needs, we still have so many more to take care of. 
We have been given a grade of D-plus by the very engineering society 
that grades our Nation's infrastructure. We have been told that we have 
100,000 bridges in this country, or 16 percent, old enough that they 
can qualify for Medicare.

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  As we know from recent disasters that we have seen in different parts 
of the country where bridges have fallen and people have literally been 
killed, we need to reinvest in that infrastructure so that we have a 
country that operates, that businesses can function.
  Also, we need to help create those jobs now for people who are still 
out of work. As the economy is coming back, we know that wages have 
been stagnant, and these are good, strong, family-supporting jobs that 
can provide it.
  The Congressional Progressive Caucus will soon be putting out our 
version of the budget, just as we will among the Democrats and the 
Republicans, but we will put out our version of the budget--just as the 
President has--with a deep investment in our infrastructure needs 
because we know that that investment is one of the pillars of the 
strong economy.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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